Matt's Debt.
by JayIshida
Summary: A story about Matt and Tai's friendship. Matt has a debt that must be paid but can Tai save his soul before it is destroyed by this new digimon?
1. An Old Debt

Matt walked down the lonely road in this city of mischief. The city bustled around his bubble of dreamlike thought. He passed by 24-hour store after 24-hour store. Why did this city never stop? All it ever did was move and hiss in the day and night. He felt like he was the only person that ever slept and even that wasn't much anymore. After trekking through the wild suburban jungle, he finally reached his apartment. He grabbed the keys from his deep pocket and threw them into the lock. He pushed the door open and slung his bag down onto the hardwood floor.

"Dad?" The apathetic tone in his voice was deeply noticeable. Matt didn't know why he bothered anymore. His dad was never home and he never saw him anymore. He just glided into his room and flopped onto the bed. He groaned and turned to look at his answering machine, it was beeping. With much lethargic movement he stretched over to the play button and gently pressed his finger down onto it. The beep split his brain in two.

"Matt, it's Tai. Where have you been? I haven't seen you in days and I'm worried about you. Can we get together sometime? Yah know … do something, like normal friends? Just phone back OK? Just to let me know you're alive." Matt rolled his eyes and looked at his bag that was all the way back in the hall where his mobile phone was. The beep rang again.

"Ermm … hi Matt, it's TK. You remember me right? You know that little brother that you haven't spoken to IN DAYS!? Are you even still alive? I'm getting worried about you … look just phone me OK?" Matt looked at his bag again … too far to go for it; I'll do it later. The beep hit his brain once more.

"Matt it's Dad. I'm going to be late tonight so could you make food for…" Matt hit the machines button to move onto the next message. He'd heard this pre-recorded crap before. The long beep that followed was the end of the messages. He deleted them all and just lay there, staring at the ceiling. After a couple of minutes he was gone, back to the world of dreamers.

Matt lazily opened his eyes; the alarm clock on his right started to come into focus. 4:30am, great. 4hours of sleep; it's probably the most he's had out of all the nights recently. The apartment was silent; not even the wind could be heard. Matt crept out of his room into the hallway to grab his bag. His life was in this bag, well the majority of it. He kept everything but his instruments in this bag. It was a shoulder bag and it was big. Sort of like a flapdoozy from yakpak.com. He hulked it onto his shoulder and quietly crept over to the couch.

When he sat down with the bag it suddenly dawned on him that he was hungry. His stomach growling broke the tremendous silence. He sighed and opened up his bag; he rooted in there and pulled a few things out onto the coffee table in front of the couch. These were: a book made of recycled paper, a fountain pen and ink cartridges, his mobile phone and a CD player with a couple of CD's. The last thing he pulled out was a packet of chicken noodles.

He grabbed the noodles and hoped over the couch to get to the kitchen where he picked up a pan and boiled some water to cook the noodles in. Once the water was boiling he emptied the contents of the packet into the pan and sat back to wait for them to cook. Finally, after 15 minutes of waiting they were done. He emptied any excess water out into the sink and tipped the noodles into a bowl. He ran back to the couch with a big grin on his face, he pulled his favourite pair of chopsticks out of his bag and wolfed down the noodles. After he'd finished he sat back and sighed in relief.

He picked up the CD player and one of the compilation CD's Izzy had made him. Luckily his CD player actually still had some battery life in it, he'd been listening to it a lot recently and he was too lazy to go and get the AC adapter for it. He examined the front of the CD. It had the songs listed on the front: **New Found Glory – My Friends Over You**, **Trigun – HT**, **Chad Kroeger – Hero**, **Muse – Dead Star**, **Box Car Racer – I Feel So**, **Glay – Way of Difference** and **Gravitation – THE RAGE BEAT**. He loved this CD; it was the one he listened to the most. He had asked Izzy to download some American and British music for him because he was getting really influenced by them. He put the CD into the CD player and crammed the headphones into his ears.

After hearing the first few minutes of "My Friends Over You" he picked up his mobile phone and looked at the screen. The little message icon was flashing and the screen read "2 messages received." He would have given anyone two guesses as to which two people had sent them. He opened them up and sure enough one was from Tai and one from TK. He read the two messages and they basically just re-iterated what had been left on his answering machine. He sat in thought at what to write back to Tai and TK. I guess he was still a little shocked that they hadn't given up on him yet like everyone else had … I mean it had been a while since they'd last talked.

He geared up his phone to the reply stage and wrote a short sweet message to Tai. "Sure, if you want to meet up, text me with a day and time and I'll be there. Don't worry about me Tai I'm still alive." He pretty much wrote the same to TK but just changing the name. After finishing off the text messages he grabbed the book of recycled paper and started writing until the sun rose in the sky.

***

It was a new day now and Matt was towelling himself off after a quick shower. He looked into his wardrobe for some clothes to wear. After much thought he grabbed a long sleeved white T-shirt, a dark cream short sleeved T-shirt and a pair of black flared jeans. He quickly threw the clothes on and checked his mobile phone for messages. There was one, it was from Tai. "OK, meet me in the Park at 9:00am and we'll get some breakfast." Matt said he would go and if there was one thing he still held onto it was his word. So after realising it was now 8:30am he grabbed the stuff from the coffee table; crammed it into his bag and bolted for the door.

Tai sat on the grass in the park, underneath the tree where he and Matt used to meet each other to hang out. They were older now but Tai's friendship for Matt had never weakened. The sun beat down onto the grass, which was dry and flaky. Tai was wearing a bright orange hoody with a white T-shirt underneath and his usual shorts with a pair of trainers. Tai felt someone standing beside him, he looked to his other side to see a slim figure with a gigantic shoulder bag.

"MATT! It's been so long!" Tai jumped up of the ground and grabbed Matt so hard in a hug that the two of them tumbled to the floor onto the ground. Matt and Tai laughed at each other and slowly sat up on the grass. The two beamed with grins at each other.

"Hey Tai."

"Matt where have you been? I've been really worried about you, I haven't seen you for like a month." Tai's face flooded with a worried expression.

"I've been around Tai … I've just been around." Matt looked at the ground; he couldn't bare to look into Tai's eyes anymore.

"I spoke to TK … he said he hadn't seen you for almost forever … he's really worried about you. It's not like we're doing this to irritate you Matt it's just that we care. We care about you and that makes us worry…" Tai was interrupted rapidly.

"I know Tai … and it's nothing personal I've just been really busy and … things. It's just kind of complicated and it's not something I want to get into right now, OK? You understand right…" Tai nodded his head and smiled at his best friend and hugged him one last time.

"Come on. You want to go get some coffee?" Matt nodded back and smiled. The two got up off the ground and started to walk towards the direction of the local coffee shop. Behind them though, a grumble from the ground started to vibrate their eardrums. The two stopped and slowly turned around to see the calm of the Park be destroyed by this eerie rumbling. It wasn't an earthquake it was something else, something that could never have come from the Earth. The air in front of them started to swirl and it looked like something was ripping straight through the fabric that sewed the park together. In a bright flash of light a wormhole of great proportion broke through into this world. Through it appeared a Digimon unlike any they had ever seen, it looked almost like an enormous centipede but different. It was too hard to describe. It looked Matt directly in the eyes.

"It's time. It's time to pay your debt." Matt's face turned to one of stone and he walked towards the wormhole. Tai stood in shock.

"But Matt … what's going on? I don't understand." Tai was worried beyond belief. Matt turned around to face his best friend.

"I told you at the beginning of all this Tai, I'm no saint. It's over, everything is over." As he spoke, he reached into his bag and pulled his recycled paper book to the top. Tai was dazed and confused with what was going on. "It's time for me to leave." He turned to face the wormhole that had opened behind him and nodded to the new Digimon. As he turned the book that was in his bag dropped onto the crisp dry grass of the Park.

"But Matt I don't understand!" His words were lost in the haze of confusion as Matt walked into the wormhole, to be lost forever? Tai didn't know. He tried to run forward to stop him or run after him but the wormhole had closed and he just fell to the ground, the grass scratching at his face. The only clue he had was that book. He picked it up and looked it at. What could Matt have possibly wanted him to see in this book?

****

End of Chapter 1


	2. The Dark Monsters Cave

Tai stood in the park where his best friend had just been standing. He was dazed and confused from the events that had just passed by. He didn't understand what was going on but he knew he had to find out. This was his best friend, not just some random person who'd gone through a vortex. Dark clouds had been gradually forming over the morning and little droplets of clear rain splashed onto Tai's face. He took the book in his hands and hid it under his jacket as the rain started to fall more and more violently. It fell onto the ground and softened the cracking skin of the grass.

Tai's feet were now taking him in the direction of a person who he knew would be able to figure this out. If anyone knew Matt as well as he did it was TK. He ran as fast and hard as he could, the rain beating down onto his supple body. His hair became more and more tangled as he ran but he didn't care. All that mattered was Matt. After running for quite some time he finally made it to TK's apartment. He stopped at the foot of the staircase and took a few moments to catch his breath. He finally finished running up the staircase and rang the doorbell of the Takaishi residence violently. He could hear muffled rumbles of "Yeah … I'm coming!" through the pine door before it swung open.

"Yeah what do you…" TK stopped immediately as he was faced with a soaked and tired Tai Kamiya. "Tai? What the hell are you doing here?" Tai was too tired to speak, so TK took action. "Tai, you're soaked. Come inside and get dry." The weary boy walked into the apartment shaking his hair dry and running a hand through it. The two boys walked into the main room of the apartment and sat down on a couch. Tai pulled the book out slowly from under his orange hoody.

"I need … to find out … what this means." Tai spoke between short, jerky breaths.

"Well … what is it?" Tai shrugged handing him the book. "Why is it so important?" Tai had finally caught the majority of his breath back and could talk normally again.

"Matt just followed an evil Digimon into a vortex by a Digimon and I don't know what's wrong but something is and I need to find out. This is the only thing he left when he went through the vortex." TK sat stunned for a moment.

"Matt did what? We need to help him and… and…" TK stopped for a moment to regain control over himself. "Wait … I thought this was all supposed to be over? Didn't you try and stop him?"

"I DID TRY AND STOP HIM!" Tai snapped back exasperated. "but he disappeared before I could do anything." Tai pondered for a moment. "I thought this was supposed to be all over too … but apparently it's not so for Matt."

"Did Matt say anything before he left? Anything that could be useful?" TK interrogated the boy thoroughly.

"Yeah." Tai took a moment to remember the exact wording. "He said 'I told you at the beginning of all this Tai, I'm no saint. It's over, everything is over.' That isn't the weirdest thing though. The weirdest thing was what the Digimon said that came through the portal. He said 'It's time to pay your debt.' What the hell could that mean?" TK sat in thought, staring out the window for answers.

"I don't know Tai but we sure do need to find out, otherwise Matt may be gone forever." TK opened the front cover of the book and looked at the print. It was like no language he had ever seen before; he couldn't make any sense of it. He showed the books pages to Tai. "Do you have any idea what language this is?" Tai shook his head.

"We know someone who might though!" The two boys nodded and said together. "Izzy."

"Look. We need to work fast so here's what we'll do. I'll ring around everyone and start asking for their help, while you go to Izzy and ask him about this text. I'll ring ahead and tell him you're coming."

"Right." Tai got up, shoving the book under his vibrant orange hoody once more. He moved towards the door.

"Tai wait." Tai turned to meet TK's worried, innocent, eyes. "Be careful and … take a coat, it's still throwing it down out there." Tai smiled at his friend and nodded.

"I will TK, I promise." With those words Tai was heading for the door of the apartment once more but as he closed the door he heard the faint whimpers of a young boy. Tai couldn't bare to think about TK being in pain and just ran to the train station as fast as he could.

Izzy lived a fair distance away from TK and it took Tai forty minutes to reach his apartment. It was still raining, badly, but it didn't slow Tai Kamiya down; nothing slowed Tai Kamiya down. The huge apartment building stood before Tai and, once more, he paused to catch his breath for a second before running up the long staircase. He rang the doorbell of Izzy's apartment frantically but the door was opened within seconds. Tai didn't waste time explaining he just threw the book in the direction of Izzy and followed the boy in.

Tai flopped down onto Izzy's bed for a short break; it had suddenly dawned on him that he hadn't eaten yet.

"TK explained everything to me over the phone. I'll see if I can find anything online that looks remotely like this text in the book." Izzy flipped through the pages one after another to see if there was anything that looked remotely familiar; he was well versed in many languages. He stopped suddenly. "Tai … there's something here in English." Tai hopped up off the bed quickly and ran to Izzy's side. He read the words aloud to himself.

"Dear journal. It's been a while since I last wrote in here and I am too tired to code this, just.too.tired. It's not that Earth shatteringly important anyway. I miss my friends, yah know? It's been so long … but I can't talk to them now … after what happened. I wish I could though … I'd trade anything to see Tai again and to here him laugh … and to make me laugh. I haven't laughed in so long. I haven't slept either, I feel like the un-dead. Ever since it happened I just can't seem to sleep. Your pages don't give me much comfort but it'll have to do. It's all just a waiting game now. Just… time…" The writing finished there, and it was signed with Matt's signature. All the pages were signed with his signature.

"I am too tired to code this." Izzy thought to himself aloud. "This isn't written in a language Tai. This is a code that Matt made up. There is no point in me looking for it online … the only way to figure this out is to find the code reference sheet. Matt must have one, if he gave you this book. I could try and guess his secret language but it wouldn't be anywhere near accurate, I wouldn't even know where to start."

"He missed us, didn't he?" Tai spoke in a whisper.

"Yeah … I guess he did." Izzy looked at the leader of the digidestined. He seemed so … weak now. Izzy remembered all the times when Tai was making decisions back in the digital world; he never once looked weak. Izzy often didn't agree with the logic of his choices but he stood by what he thought and if it didn't work Tai would always come through for them. This wasn't the Tai Kamiya that Izzy knew, this was something else.

Tai snapped out of his coma like state.

"We have to move … I'll ring TK and ask him to ransack Matt's apartment to see if he can find that code reference sheet. We have to know what this book means otherwise … Matt may be lost forever." Tai shook his head at the thought. He wouldn't accept losing his best friend to some Digimon creep. He ran to the phone to instruct TK on the plan, only hoping that he was still at home.

*******************************

Matt walked through this strange world. There was no colour here. It was just darkness. He felt it in the pit of his stomach, all the sadness that was here; it was overwhelming for any person. The centipede Digimon that had led him into this realm of the dark was eyeing him closely, making sure he didn't do anything stupid. Matt was too absorbed in his own thoughts to be bothered about the pathetic Digimon watching him. He couldn't help thinking if Tai would be able to decipher the book, would he understand? He cursed himself inside. This wasn't Tai's problem; this was his. He'd got himself into this mess and it wasn't Tai's, TK's, Izzy's or anybody else's responsibility to get him out of it. It was his.

The passage that the two walked along was small and formed from walls of jagged rocks that crept up to form a ceiling. The rocks weren't rocks though; they were lavish, beautiful, crystals. In this world though, they were blacker than the night sky. Matt felt un-easy as he walked past them, they sent shivers down his spine and he felt the cold hand of evil stroking his soul.

After several minutes of walking in silence they finally reached their destination. Matt looked around to see a large room made out of the same crystals that coated the walls. The fires that burnt on the walls were grey and gave off a subtle tone of grey light. The room was still very dark and the floor soil. The centipede type Digimon slithered into the large room. In this room was a table, a few doors, a fireplace, some comfy chairs and some decorative paintings on the walls. It was very eloquent for an evil Digimon's hide out.

"Master! I have brought him!" The centipede shouted. His voice was deep and threatening, in a subtle way. Matt's eyes glazed around the room at the doors. One of them flung open and standing in the doorway was … Tai?

"Hi Matt!" Tai called bubbling to his friend. Matt stared at the boy with scorn.

"Stop IT! STOP IT NOW!" Matt shouted out across the darkness. Tai just cackled with delight and ran over to Matt, to stare him in the face. Matt's face held a look of pure hatred.

"What? You no like seeing your best friend?" Tai talked in a baby voice and it scraped against Matt's heart.

"Stop it Mimicmon! I'M WARNING YOU!" Matt shouted into the face of his so-called best friend. Tai cackled back into Matt's face starting to transform from the small boy into a giant, slim, hooded figure. This was what Matt had feared for years. The Digimon standing in front of him was shaped as a human but he was very thin and had a long black draping cloak covering his body. His hands were dangling out of the cloak for a second and Matt caught a glimpse of the thin, bony fingers. They had small rings on, with enormous jewels encrusted onto them. Mimicmon took his hands and placed them inside the opposite cuffs of his long robe.

"It's been a long time Matt, glad to be back?" Matt shook his head in disgust.

"I've never been glad to see you since the first day I met you Mimicmon."

"That's what I always liked about you Matt, you were feisty and stood up for yourself." Mimicmon's real voice was scathing and high pitched. It grated against Matt's fragile eardrums. Mimicmon noticed the bag on Matt's shoulder. "Oh take that silly bag away Centimon, Matt won't be needing such things now." If Mimicmon had a face, Matt was sure he would be smirking. Mimicmon didn't have a true face. It was shaped like a face but was flat and smooth as porcelain; like an un-painted china doll discarded from the factory.

Centimon took the bag from Matt with a little resistance from the Digidestined. He scuttled off into a near by room slouching under the weight of the bag. Matt and Mimicmon were left, facing each other. Matt stared at the dark shadowy hood of Mimicmon; not showing his true un-measurable fear.

"You have a few days Matt. After that, you repay your debt to me and we re-work the prophecy's of the Digital world!" Chuckling to himself at the prospect of changing the digital world's fate, he escorted Matt to one of the doors. "You will stay here until I call for you. You will not ask for anything, you will not disturb me. You know the price if you break these rules." Matt nodded his head with sorrow and was thrown through the door into the room.

It was a small room, all it had was a bed, a shelf with one or two books on and another door leading to a wash room. How had Matt got himself into this mess? What had he done to deserve this kind of torture? He thought of his friends … he closed his eyes and pictured the smiling faces of his brother and Tai. He was doing this for them, that's why he was doing it … but at what cost? He didn't know if what he was doing was right but there was a chance that he would save his friends and that's all that mattered now.


	3. The World Isn't The Same No More

__

"Matt wait!" The little blonde boy ran as fast as his legs would carry him. He was short but quite cute. A taller boy turned around sharply to see the little child running at him, arms spread out.

"TK. What's wrong?" Matt looked into his brother's tearful eyes. TK flung his arms around his brother's waist and held on for dear life.

"I don't want you to go Matt! Please don't go, I know I'm not the best brother but I don't want you to go!" Matt's turtleneck sweater muffled TK's voice. Matt pulled TK away from him and picked him up so he could look at him straight in the eyes.

"TK, don't ever talk like that. I love you very much and you're the best little brother I could ask for." TK sniffled and smiled slightly. "I don't want to go but I have to."

"But why?" TK always asked questions, bless youthful curiosity.

"Because we don't live together anymore TK. I have to go home with Dad but I promise that I'll come and visit you as much as I can, I promise. Nothing will keep us apart."

"You really promise Matt?"

"I really promise TK."

--------------------

The words rang in Matt's brain as he lay in his cell. He promised his little brother that he'd go back and see him but did he? No. He couldn't go and see him ever again. Not after what had happened with Mimicmon. He wanted to protect his little brother but he couldn't protect him without hurting him. Tai had hit him once when they were talking about TK … that was the only one of Tai's punches that actually hurt. Matt knew that Tai was right and that he should have gone back to TK … but Matt couldn't do it. He couldn't put his little brother in danger.

Another memory sprung back into his head.

--------------------

__

"Hey Matt!" Tai Kamiya ran towards his best friend who was walking away from him.

"Tai?" Matt turned back to see his best friend; it had been a while. He was looking toned from playing so much sport. Matt had his huge bag with him and Tai had a football under his arms. Typical.

"Is that sheet music?" Tai asked when he finally caught up with his friend.

"Ermm … yeah, it is."

"So you're still playing then?" Matt nodded his head solemnly.

"On and off." He paused for a moment; the tension between the two of them was immense. "What are you doing here Tai?" The question had a certain level of destine in it.

"I was just … playing some football and saw you. Thought we could talk…"

"It's been a long time Tai, maybe too long."

"It's never too long." Tai stated with absolute conviction. "We said we'd be friends for ever Matt … what happened to us?"

"Nothing lasts forever Tai, you should have grasped this concept by now." Tai shook his head and choked out a slight scoff of indignation.

"You've not changed a bit. Why am I even bothering? When you realise what you loose by acting this way Matt, tell me. I'll ALWAYS believe in our friendship."

--------------------

Matt shook his head to try and get rid of the memory and the tear rolling down his cheek. He couldn't shake the thought of Tai … his eyes were so powerful when he spoke. "I'll always believe in our friendship." Matt spoke softly to himself. He wished he had something to write with or his guitar … just something to get what was inside of him out.

It's just a waiting game now … waiting.

*******************************

TK tore Matt's room to shreds. There was no pillow unturned in that room; he still hadn't found what he was looking for though. He sat on Matt's bed and looked at the mess surrounding him. "Come on Matt where would you put a secret code. You wouldn't write it on a piece of paper because that's just too damned easy isn't it? What would you do?" TK mused to himself as he scanned the room. "It must be something that's important to you…" He looked around the room one more time and on the bedside cabinet one lonely photo had remained standing from TK's onslaught. It was a picture of himself and Matt that had been taken along time ago. The two of them were smiling, happy then. He picked it up too look at it. Then he thought. "What if…"

TK cracked the back of the frame open and there scribbled on the underside of the photograph was Matt's secret code sheet. There was a note also; it had TK written on the top of it. He gently lifted it off and read it aloud to himself.

****

"Dear TK. If you're reading this then I'm probably not around and have gone missing. Well … it's a long and complicated story but most of it is detailed in my journal, I don't want to write about that here. I just wanted to say … I always loved you TK, don't ever think I didn't. I know I may have been a really bad brother and you probably hate me but … well maybe after you read my journal it might make some sort of sense. Just know that I never meant to hurt you and I will ALWAYS be your big brother. – Matt"

TK clutched onto the note for dear life, in the slight chance that it might slip out of his fingers and be lost forever. Tears dripped from his eyes and he tried to stop them but he couldn't. Matt was really gone and Matt really did love him. He ran to the apartment door and tried to get back to Izzy's as fast as he possibly could, tears teeming down his face.

*******************************

Centimon rapped his short stumpy hands on Matt's door. "The master wants to see you." Matt got up slowly off his bed and followed the slithering Digimon back into the main hall. A lavish spread of food covered the large dining table. Mimicmon was sat at the head of the table an ushered Matt to the seat next to him. Matt sat down on the table and starred at the food in front of him with great suspicion.

"What's this all about Mimicmon?"

"I thought we should get to know each other before we became partners. You know ruling the world will be such a bore if you keep that attitude up Matt." Matt screwed his face up in disgust.

"I HAVE A PARTNER!" Matt screamed at Mimicmon. "Don't ever forget that Mimicmon." Matt's rage flooded his voice and strangled his throat.

"Ahhh, yes. Gabumon wasn't it?" Mimicmon chuckled. "I hate to be the bearer of bad news Matt but sadly Gabumon is no more." Matt's face dropped and he turned slowly to meet Mimicmon's cloaked hood.

"What … what do you mean gone?" Matt stammered out.

"Sadly, he met with a grave accident. Appears some evil Digimon attacked him and deleted his data." Matt's face was racked with absolute horror. Gabumon couldn't be _gone_. This was his best friend … for life.

"But … he would have been restored at primary village." Mimicmon shrugged.

"Perhaps but no one has seen his egg for quite some time." Matt wasn't going to believe this. He couldn't trust this _thing_. "Oh, I believe these were found near the site of his deletion." Mimicmon handed Matt a Digivice and the crest of friendship. Matt's shaking hand reached out and took them from Mimicmon.

"It's … my Digivice and crest. I gave this to Gabumon to look after when I left." Matt paused for a minute or two, just staring at the objects in his hand. "I guess he really is gone."

"Yes. Well this leaves you in somewhat of a predicament my young friend. To complete the tasks required to pay your debt to me, you need a Digimon. Lucky for you I just so happen to be a Digimon."

"I'll never be your partner Mimicmon. A partner is someone…" Mimicmon interrupted by slamming his hand down onto the table.

"You defiant little child! You act like you have some kind of choice in this matter! Do you not remember what happens if you do not do what I say? Little children who don't obey Mimicmon wave 'bye bye' to their friends. Do you understand?" Matt had never seen Mimicmon like this before, shouting and angry. He decided it was best to just accept it. He couldn't let Mimicmon kill his friends.

"Yes."

"Good. Now take that plate of food and go back to your room." Matt took the plate of food and walked back into his room. He heard the subtle click of the lock locking. Matt leant against the door and sank down to the floor crying.

"Gabumon … no…" He cried his heart out, constantly looking at his Digivice and Crest.


	4. No Light At The End of This Tunnel

Tai was sitting in the park in Odaiba. He couldn't stand sitting around waiting for Izzy to decode Matt's journal. There were pages of it and he just couldn't stand not doing anything. He was glad TK had found the code sheet, now they might actually be able to start unravelling this mystery. There were so many questions that he had and there was no way he could find the answers.

He looked out into the parks pond, the water was glistening with the reflection of the sunlight. The sun was almost ready to set and the scene was beautiful. People walked through the park with happy smiling faces and the birds fluttered their wings slowly disrupting the cool, pristine, surface of the water. Tai's eyes glazed over and the world was a million miles away.

"Breep, Breep." A small vibration and noise from his pocket snapped him out of his daydream. He grabbed the cell-phone from his shorts pocket and answered it.

"Yeah?"

"Tai, it's Izzy. I've deciphered nearly all of Matt's journal, I think you should come back and take a look at this." Tai nodded to himself.

"OK Izzy, I'll be there in a couple of seconds." He clicked the cell-phone off and started running for Izzy's house.

***********************************************************

****

I close my eyes when I get too sad

I think thoughts that I know are bad

Close my eyes and I count to ten

I hope it's over when I open them

I want the things that I had before

Like a Star Wars poster on my bedroom door

I wish I could count to ten

Make everything be wonderful again

Matt stared at the black crystals on the walls of his cell. He hated this room, the walls screamed at him; they just reminded him of Gabumon. Black, empty, gone. Why did Gabumon have to get himself killed? Damned Gabumon, all he had to do was stay alive.

"They'll pay. I'll destroy everything in the digital world. Nothing will stop me! I'll destroy the place that got Gabumon killed!" Matt screamed at the walls of his cell. His face was screwed up into pure hatred. Nothing mattered to him anymore, nothing. The one thing that he knew he could always rely on was gone and along with it was his heart. He shut his eyes to black out the darkness in the room and his soul.

****

I hope my mom and I hope my dad

Will figure out why they get so mad

I hear them scream, I hear them fight

Say bad words that make me wanna cry

Close my eyes when I go to bed

And I dream adventures that will make me smile

I feel better when I hear them say

Everything will be wonderful someday

He sat in silence for a couple of minutes. His hatred and rage burned deep inside of his soul. All he wanted to do was destroy, destroy everything that had taken his best friend away from him. He had no friends now; he had no concept of the word love. All of it had been taken from him. Tears started to well from his tightly shut eyelids. He tried to stop them but he couldn't, he couldn't help but feel sorry for himself. Why did he have to go through this by himself? If there was a hell, he was sure this was it.

All Matt could think of was TK … he wanted to see his little brother so badly, give him a hug. Just tell him that he loved him and the world would be OK … but it was never going to turn out like that, now was it?

****

Promises mean everything when you're little

And the world's so big

I just don't understand how,

You can smile with all those tears in your eyes

Tell me everything is wonderful now

That stupid promise he'd made to TK, did it even matter anymore? No, it didn't. He was going to destroy everything that the digidestined held dear and they couldn't do anything to stop it. He didn't care anymore; reason was thrown out the window. All that filled his mind was wave, after wave, of vile hatred. He roughly wiped the tears from his eyes and sniffled.

"The Digidestined are going to pay for all this, all they helped to save! All of them have to go. All of them." Matt muttered to himself.

****

Please don't tell me everything is wonderful now

Please don't tell me everything is wonderful now

I go to school and I run & play

I tell the kids that it's all-ok

I like to laugh so my friends won't know

When the bell rings I just don't wanna go home

Go to my room and I close my eyes

I make believe that I have a new life

I don't believe you when you say

Everything will be wonderful someday

"No more lying. From today on, there will only be the truth."

***********************************************************

Tai raced back into Izzy's small room. Sat in the room were TK, Izzy, Joe, Kari, Sora, Davis, Cody, Yolie and Ken.

"That was quick, what did you find?"

"Yeah, with all of us working we've pretty much got it all now." Izzy replied. Tai was panting from the run back. Izzy held up the translated words in his hand and wafted them at Tai. "That's it Tai." Tai snatched the papers from Izzy's hand quickly and read deeply into the words, immersing himself into Matt's mind.

No one spoke while Tai poured over the sheets of paper the nine other digidestined had translated. Tai stopped on one particular page and his face dropped in horror at the words he read.

"This page. Are you sure it's right?" Tai held it up to show Izzy, he nodded.

"Ken and I checked it three times each. There are no mistakes with that page, I can assure you." Ken nodded to back up what Izzy was saying. Tai couldn't understand how this could be true. Although it explained the mysterious behaviour from his best friend. Tai read the page again just to be sure.

__

Dear journal,

Hi, it's Matt. Today something … something happened and I need to talk about it. I met a Digimon called Mimicmon and … and he threatened me. He threatened my friends. Tai, TK, Izzy, Joe, Kari … everyone. I don't know what to do, he scares me and … he tricked me into thinking he was Tai. He can change his form to be anyone or anything. It scares me. What if he's here in the real world? What if he attacks my friends and I can't stop him!

He told me that I have to stop seeing them, that if I don't distance myself from them he'll … kill them. I don't ever want to stop seeing my friends … especially Tai and TK but how can I still see them knowing that it will kill them? It would hurt them so much … but maybe hurting them a little is the only way to save their lives. A life without me is better than no life at all.

He said that he wants me to do something, "help him re-write the prophecy's of the digital world" is what he said. I don't know exactly what that means but he said he'd come for me when the time is right. What if it is when I'm 30? Can I really live my whole life in fear of what some whacked out Digimon is going to do? I guess I have to.

I never thought that I'd ever be lonely, the thought sends shivers down my spine but … I guess this is my life now. The crest of friendship is no more…

-Matt Ishida

Tai shook his head at the words. 'How wrong you are Matt.' Tai thought to himself. 'I'd rather die than have you do what you did to us. Stupid jerk! If there was one person you could have told … we would have handled this together, as a team.'

"Well, what do we do now?" Davis asked.

"I … I don't know." Tai stammered out, flopping down onto Izzy's bed. He just felt like lying there and sleeping it all away, maybe it was just a dream.

"He's clearly not in the digital world." Ken said matter-of-factly. Izzy nodded.

"Ken's right. There are no portals from the Real World to the Digital World open right now. No one can get in or out."

"So he's been taken to some other place? Where they can get to the Digital world from?" TK asked, trying to keep a level head in all this mess. He missed his brother greatly and what he read had saddened him but he knew to get him back he would have to stay calm.

"Yep but … I have no idea how to find that place, I mean who knows how many different dimensions there are? It would be like finding an atom in the universe." Izzy replied his voice agitated. Why didn't he have the answer for TK? He looked at the small blond boy, so sad sitting there. Damnit, this was his job in the group, knowledge remember? There really wasn't anyway of finding Matt that he knew of.

"So we wait." Tai said coldly from his spot on the bed. The room looked at him with a quizzical expression.

"What do you mean we wait? Are you crazy, we have to do SOMETHING!" Davis screamed.

"No. We wait. From what Matt wrote it doesn't sound like he knows too much about this thing either, I doubt HE even knows where he is. I have a feeling that whatever this is, it's big. So we wait for something to happen." Izzy gave a small 'humph' in reply to Tai's suggestion.

"Not the best tactical move I ever heard of but Tai's right; we have no way of finding Matt so we have to let him find us." Joe sighed.

"Waiting, great. Wonder what THIS will do to my blood pressure." The blue haired hypochondriac cupped his chin in his hands and rested on his elbows.

"Come on everybody, it's time to go home." Tai said, getting up off the bed. He opened the door and ushered everybody out. TK was the last one walking out of Izzy's apartment with only Tai behind him. Just before he got out of the door Tai put his hand on TK's shoulder and turned him so the two boys faced each other.

TK looked straight into Tai's eyes and they were filled with compassion, Tai slipped his arms around TK's neck and drew him into a tight hug.

"Listen Takeru, if you need anything and I mean ANYTHING, you come and speak to me OK?"

"OK, Tai." TK replied, revelling in the warm safety of Tai's hug.

"Awww TK, I know how hard this must be for you but … Matt will be OK, I prom.."

"Don't promise Tai. I'm too old for promises." TK interrupted quickly. His voice was filled with a cold and bitter tone. Tai squeezed TK lightly then let him out of the embrace.

"OK TK, it's time to go home." Tai opened the door and ushered the small digidestined out of the door.

***********************************************************

"Your plan seems to be coming together nicely master." Centimon spoke in his deep menacing voice.

"Yes." Mimicmon chuckled. "Matt shall soon be unstable enough to perform the ceremony. I'll finally rule the digital world!"

"Master, if you don't mind me asking, why did you choose Matt? I mean out of all the digidestined, why him?"

"Because Matt was the weakest out of them all. He was the easiest to cause self-doubt in. All of the others most likely would of broken and turned to their friends for help and then all would have been lost. Not Matt though, nope, not the bearer of the crest of friendship. It's very ironic really." Centimon laughed.

"Those silly digidestined won't know what hit them." Centimon laughed "I can't believe he bought that his Digimon was gone, what did you do with him. When do you think he'll be ready?"

"Soon. Very soon. It's just a matter of patience and Gabumon? Well … let's just say he's alive but in a not so safe place." Mimicmon laughed to himself.

****

A/N: Thank you a lot to Matt (PenID: 148974) who keeps reminding me I still have a fic to write ;) Thanks to everyone who is reviewing BTW! :D I love all the comments ^^;;

Oh so everyone knows, the lyrics are from a song called "Wonderful" by the fabulous Everclear and no, that is NOT a Taikeru hint at the end :P Sorry to spoil your fun ;)


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